1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to vehicle attachments, and more particularly to a reversible license plate holder for use by a dealer in quickly installing and removing a dealer plate and in subsequent use by an owner of the vehicle to permanently retain a private license plate onto the rear of the vehicle.
2. Description of Related Art
When car and truck dealers acquire new and used vehicles ready for sale on one of their storage lots, typically a license plate holder will be attached to a rear panel of the vehicle specifically intended for attachment of a license plate thereto. These conventional license plate holders include logos and viewable indicia identifying the name of the dealer and also provide for mounting holes to attach the holder with a dealer license plate held within the holder to the rear panel of the vehicle. This dealer plate attachment is required, for example, whenever sales personnel allow the vehicle to go for a test drive by and with a potential customer or otherwise drive a dealer vehicle from the lot.
Currently, several cumbersome methods are used to attach the dealer's license plate to the rear of the vehicle. One method of attachment is through the use of a large magnet mechanically attached to the license plate and then magnetically attached to any steel part of the vehicle. However, the magnets may fail during the test drive, scratch the vehicle paint, or be unusable because there are no ferrous metal components available for magnetic attachment thereto. Another method of attaching a dealer license plate to the vehicle utilizes a heavy rubber license plate frame having two long rubber straps which may be hung from the vehicle's trunk lid when closed. This requires the trunk to be opened and closed for every test ride, many vehicles not supporting this approach to dealer plate attachment. A third method would be to simply unscrew the bolts from the license plate holder on the vehicle and then to attach the dealer plate in the normal position reusing the screws with or without the holder. This requires extra time and utilization of a tool in the form of a wrench or screw driver which typically is hard to locate in a large dealership setting. A fourth method is to place the dealer license plate in the rear of the window which can cause rattling, scratching of the rear defroster grid on the rear window, and still fail to provide adequate viewability of the dealer license plate during the test drive. Another unacceptable option for sales personnel is to simply do a test ride without a dealer plate attached whatsoever.
The present invention relieves the dealership personnel of the burden of less than ideal means for temporarily attaching the dealer license plate onto a new or used vehicle for demonstration ride or transport purposes. Once the invention is attached by threaded fasteners to the rear panel of the vehicle provided by the manufacturer, installation and removal of the dealer license plate for each test ride is quickly accomplished without the need for tools or other clumsy attachment techniques and with full assurance that the installation of the dealer license plate will be fully in compliance with all local and state laws requiring that vehicles driven from the dealer's property, whether for customer test drive, inventory swap, conveyance to and from an auction, or for any other purpose wherein the vehicle must be driven from the lot will be fully complied with.
The foregoing examples of the related art and limitations related therewith are intended to be illustrative and not exclusive. Other limitations of the related art will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon a reading of the specification and a study of the drawings.